美国小学英语教材6:第56课 从印第安足迹到航空邮政(1)

 From Indian Trail to Air Mail Alice T. Paine 从印度铁路到航空邮政 爱丽丝·T·派恩

When the postman leaves the mail at your door, he is just one of over 350,000 people 当邮递员将邮件放在你家门口时，他只是35万多名邮递员当中的一位，

who are busy every day seeing that the mail is delivered throughout our country. 他们每天忙碌着为全国民众寄邮件。

The post office in your town is one of the 50,000 post offices in the United States. 你城镇上的邮政局也是美国5万个邮政局中的一个。

Over fifteen billion stamps are used every year. Let us see how this great business of message-carrying 每年使用的邮票超150亿张，看看如此庞大的邮政业是如何

has grown since the days when our country was young. In the early days of our country, 发展的，自从刚刚建国开始，在美国初期，

the colonists¹ lived in little settlements along the Atlantic coast all the way from Massachusetts to Carolina. 殖民者居住在大西洋沿岸的小块殖民地上，从马赛诸塞到加州。

They were separated from each other by dense² forests and wide rivers. England, the land from which they had come, 他们被茂密的森林和宽阔的河流所隔绝，他们来自英格兰，

was far away across the Atlantic Ocean. There were no telephones or telegraphs³ or ocean cables⁴ or trains or highways, 英格兰距离大西洋很遥远，当时没有电话，电报，海地电缆，铁路或是高速，

and of course there were no radios or airplanes. Today, if we wish to send a message, 当然也没有无线电或飞机，今天如果我们希望传递信息，

we can have it delivered anywhere in the United States within a few hours. 我们可以在几个小时送达到美国各处。

If any important event happens, we may know of it within a few minutes. 如果发生了重大事件，我们可以在几分钟内知道。

We have sent messages to Byrd at the South Pole, 我们曾在南极向博德发送信息，

and we have received messages from him over thousands of miles of ice and snow, mountains and seas. 信息穿越了数千英里的冰雪，山峰和海洋，我们接收到了他的信息。

It is hard for us to realize how different things were in the early days. 我们很难想象这在早前是多么的不一样。

When George Washington died at Mount⁵ Vernon, the news did not reach Boston for ten days. 当乔治·华盛顿在弗农山庄逝世时，消息十天还没有到达波士顿。

When a new president was elected, people did not hear of it for over a month. 当新任总统当选时，人们一个多月也不知道这个消息。

If you lived then and your father or mother or brother or sister went on a journey, 如果你生活在那时，你的父亲或母亲，或兄弟姐妹出门旅行，

you could not hear from the traveler for many a day. 你或许好几天收不到旅行者的信息。

 

1 colonists   

n.殖民地开拓者，移民，殖民地居民( colonist的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Colonists from Europe populated many parts of the Americas. 欧洲的殖民者移居到了美洲的许多地方。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Some of the early colonists were cruel to the native population. 有些早期移居殖民地的人对当地居民很残忍。 来自《简明英汉词典》

2 dense   

a.密集的，稠密的，浓密的；密度大的

参考例句：

• The general ambushed his troops in the dense woods. 将军把部队埋伏在浓密的树林里。
• The path was completely covered by the dense foliage. 小路被树叶厚厚地盖了一层。

3 telegraphs   

n.电报( telegraph的名词复数 )；打电报；电报机；（轮船的）车钟

参考例句：

• He has never made any mistakes in recording telegraphs. 他抄收电报从来没有出过错。 来自互联网
• It'seems that the telegraph receiver is broken and can't receive telegraphs. 好像收报机坏了，无法收报！ 来自互联网

4 cables   

n.电报( cable的名词复数 )；电缆；（系船用的）缆绳；（船只、桥梁等上的）巨缆

参考例句：

• Use the crocodile clips to attach the cables to the battery. 用鳄鱼嘴夹把电缆接到蓄电池上。
• Please don't touch these metal cables inside a plastic sleeve. 请不要碰那些套着塑料管的金属电缆。 来自《简明英汉词典》

5 mount   

n.山峰，乘用马，框，衬纸；vi.增长，骑上（马）；vt.提升，爬上，装备

参考例句：

• Their debts continued to mount up.他们的债务不断增加。
• She is the first woman who steps on the top of Mount Jolmo Lungma.她是第一个登上珠穆朗玛峰的女人。